it, crying "Israel!"

And Israel was sorely afraid, and answered, "Speak, Lord, Thy servant
heareth."

Then the Lord said, "Thou has read of the goats whereon the high priest
cast lots, one lot for the sin offering and one lot for the scapegoat."

And Israel answered trembling, "I have read."

Then the Lord said to Israel, "Look now upon Naomi, thy child, for
she is as the sin-offering for thy sins, to make atonement for thy
transgressions, for thee and for thy household, and therefore she is
dumb to all uses of speech, and blind to all service of sight, a soul
in chains and a spirit in prison, for behold, she is as the lot that is
cast for justice and for the Lord."

And Israel groaned in his agony and cried, "Would that the lot had
fallen upon me, O Lord, that Thou mightest be justified when thou
speakest, and be clear when Thou judgest, for I alone am guilty before
Thee."

Then said the Lord to Israel, "On thee, also, hath the lot fallen, even
the lot of the scapegoat of the enemies of the people of God."

And Israel quaked with fear, and the Lord called to him again, and said,
"Israel, even as the scapegoat carries the iniquities of the people, so
cost thou carry the iniquities of thy master, Ben Aboo, and of his wife,
Katrina; and even as the goat bears the sins of the people into the
wilderness, so, in the resurrection, shalt thou bear the sins of this
man and of this woman into a land that no man knoweth."

Then Israel wrestled no longer with the Lord, but sweated as it were
drops of blood, and cried, "What shall I do, O Lord?"

And the Lord said, "Lie unto the morning, and then arise, get thee to
the country by Mequinez and to the man there whereof thou hast heard
tidings, and he shall show thee what thou shalt do."

Then Israel wept with gladness, and cried, saying, "Shall my soul live?
Shall the lot be lifted from off me, and from off Naomi, my daughter?"

But the Lord left him, the red light died out from across the bed, and
all around was darkness.

Now to the last day and hour of his life Israel would have taken oath on
the Scriptures that he saw this vision, and he heard this voice, not in
his sleep and as in a dream, but awake, and having plain sight of all
common things about him--his room and his bed; and the canopy that
covered it. And on rising in the morning, at daydawn, so actual was the
sense of what he had seen and heard, and so powerful the impression of
it, that he straightway set